The FTC restored a “long-established practice of routinely restricting future acquisitions for merging parties that pursue anticompetitive mergers,” the commission announced Monday. Commissioners Noah Phillips and Christine Wilson dissented in the 3-2 vote approving a prior approval policy statement. The statement “puts industry on notice” that merger enforcement orders will “require acquisitive firms to obtain prior approval from the agency before closing any future transaction affecting each relevant market for which a violation was alleged, for a minimum of ten years,” the agency said. A 1995 policy statement rescinded in July (see 2107210061) “had fueled consolidation by preventing the agency from imposing these merger restrictions,” the agency said.

The FCC for “way too long” hasn't accurately measured where broadband is and isn’t, said acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel during a Marconi Society virtual symposium Friday. “The best time to update our maps was probably five years ago,” Rosenworcel said. The agency is “midstream” in securing a broadband serviceable location fabric, she said (see 2107160057). “I have lots of thoughts about it. It’s not fast.” Rosenworcel said she hopes “things are going to come together in the next few months” and would like to see the maps be used to understand the intersection of issues like broadband access and health outcomes. Some states have “really engaged in quality mapping projects because we know mapping at the federal level is not the strongest,” said Public Knowledge CEO Chris Lewis on a panel. The FCC also needs to be more “creative” with the use of spectrum, Rosenworcel said. “Getting the right mix” between licensed and unlicensed spectrum is “important,” she said, noting auctions for licensed spectrum need to be made more competitive. The federal government is sitting on a lot of unused spectrum, said telecom attorney Steve Coran: “There’s a lot of ways that folks can use spectrum more efficiently.” Tribal priority windows “should be a prerequisite for every spectrum change in the future,” said Chris Mitchell, the Institute for Local Self-Reliance's director-Community Broadband Networks Initiative. Addressing the digital divide requires a focus on both “deployment and affordability,” Rosenworcel said, touting the Emergency Connectivity Fund’s impact on addressing the homework gap, and said it’s “a distinct part” of addressing the digital divide. “There is no doubt that the beating heart of our post-COVID world will be digital,” said ITU Telecom Development Bureau Director Doreen Bogdan-Martin during a keynote: “Adoption is about making sure everyone can get online because that's when we get true digital inclusion.”

T-Mobile will delay shutting down CDMA by three months until March 31, the carrier said Friday. To build out the carrier's 5G network, "we need to sunset outdated CDMA technologies as soon as possible so every consumer, no matter their circumstances, will have access to the best connectivity and best experience," it said. "This is why we have aggressively executed on plans to take care of transitioning our impacted Sprint CDMA customers by the end of this year and provided our partners plenty of time and resources to take care of their customers as well. Recently it’s become increasingly clear that some of those partners haven’t followed through on their responsibility to help their customers through this shift. So, we’re stepping up on their behalf.” The postponement won’t have “material financial impact” to T-Mobile’s business, it said. T-Mobile and Dish Network are feuding over the 3G sunset in California and at the FCC (see 2110150012 and 2105060024). DOJ raised red flags in August (see 2105060024). DOJ declined to comment now. Dish, which got Boost prepaid wireless customers as part of a divestiture when T-Mobile bought Sprint, didn't comment by our deadline. Neither did the FCC or California Public Utilities Commission.

The FCC acted reasonably and within its responsibilities to ensure the best use of spectrum in dividing 5.9 GHz, with 45 MHz for Wi-Fi and 30 MHz for cellular vehicle-to-everything technology, industry and public service intervenors told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. ITS America and the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials want the court to overturn the order (see 2106020076). “Unhappy” that the FCC “has decreased their spectrum bankroll, Appellants and Intervenors are trying to chase their losses to the Court,” said Public Knowledge and the Open Technology Institute at New America, posted Wednesday night in docket 21-1130. “But the Court cannot offer their desired relief because the FCC properly determined that the public interest called for reallocating our nation’s limited spectrum resource.” The FCC record “demonstrated that 30 megahertz is more than sufficient to deliver the public safety benefits promised” by intelligent transportation systems, they said. “Petitioners posit a fragmented scheme of spectrum-management authority that opens the door to conflicting agency judgments,” said CTIA: “The FCC’s spectrum-allocation decisions frequently touch on areas regulated by other agencies -- but that does not deprive the FCC of its preeminence in spectrum management.” Petitioners want “this Court to second-guess the FCC,” said NCTA and the Wi-Fi Alliance. “The Commission relied on its technical expertise, predictive judgment, and an extensive record to conclude that” changes to the band “will both improve wireless broadband and increase the likelihood that the automotive industry will finally deliver long-promised safety applications.” The agency “adopted conservative technical rules governing indoor operation of unlicensed devices in the lower 45 megahertz of the band to avoid any significant risk of interference between those devices and automotive-safety applications in the upper 30 megahertz,” the groups said. The 5G Automotive Association, which promotes C-V2X, said the order will “materially advance vehicular safety.”

A virtual field hearing on lessons from Hurricane Ida and other recent disasters appears likely to dominate the FCC’s Oct. 26 meeting, with two panels to start at 11 a.m. EDT, said a notice in Wednesday’s Daily Digest. One panel will offer “first-hand accounts from public safety and communications industry stakeholders responding to disasters with the goal of exploring what works, what doesn’t, and what lessons can we learn from their experiences,” the notice said: It will discuss “steps that have been, could be, and should be taken to build resiliency into networks to improve their availability and accessibility for all affected communities.” The second panel is expected to explore the voluntary wireless network resiliency cooperative framework, launched by industry in 2016, and includes a speaker from CTIA. At their last meeting, commissioners approved an NPRM on making networks more resilient during disasters (see 2109300069).

The 3.45 GHz auction continued to rise to $16 billion Wednesday, after surpassing in the second round of the day the $14.77 billion reserve price needed to close (see our news bulletin here). Experts said which major bidders stayed in, and whether Dish Network or Verizon dropped out, won’t be clear until after it closes. “Contrary to our expectations, bidders moved back into a few more large markets, causing price growth to re-accelerate to 6-7% per round from the 5% it was growing at when bidding concluded yesterday evening,” New Street’s Phillip Burnett told investors Wednesday. Some 16 MHz of excess demand nationally still “must settle before the auction can close,” he said: “We would still expect price growth to decelerate materially once bidding in large markets settles (which is likely to happen today or tomorrow).” The auction could still reach New Street’s $25 billion forecast, but that seems unlikely, he said. Potential failure loomed after one large bidder appeared to drop out in round 10, blogged Sasha Javid, BitPath chief operating officer. Speculation has focused on both Dish and Verizon exiting, he said: “While speculation of which bidder dropped out … will continue until the final bidding data is released, this large drop in demand followed by a subsequent steep drop in Round 22, certainly made auction failure plausible. It was only demand in a few of the largest markets that pushed proceeds across the reserve price.” The FCC and carrier groups declined to comment.

The FCC 3.45 GHz auction hit $13.24 billion Tuesday, after five more bidding rounds. That’s short of the $14.77 billion reserve price needed for a successful close. After a rough patch last week (see 2110140059), the auction now seems more likely to hit the reserve, New Street’s Philip Burnett told investors Monday: “However, with the elasticity of demand being unpredictable and with demand in many large markets near enough to supply that a single bidder dropping out could end bidding it that market, it is still too soon to call it.”

FCC acting Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel circulated a proposed rulemaking aimed at curbing illegal and unwanted robotexts, said a news release Monday. If adopted, the rulemaking would “explore steps to protect consumers from illegal robotexts, including network level blocking and applying caller authentication standards to text messaging,” and require mobile wireless providers to block illegal text messages. “Ensuring the integrity” of texting “is vitally important,” Rosenworcel said: “It’s time we take steps to confront this latest wave of fraud and identify how mobile carriers can block these automated messages before they have the opportunity to cause any harm.”

The FCC's 3.45 GHz auction closed at $6.53 billion Friday, up from $4.25 billion Thursday amid concerns the sale could fail (see 2110140059) after one round Thursday when a bidder dropped 20 MHz of demand in more than 50 large markets. “We don’t know whether a national carrier simply realized they won’t be able to win 40MHz in large markets and reduced demand, or if a financial bidder dropped out (though we suspect the latter),” New Street’s Philip Burnett told investors: “With at least 16 rounds remaining until the auction minimum is reached and excess demand having halved since the auction started, our confidence that the auction will close is waning.” Excess demand is decreasing, “but in a more traditional way,” emailed BitPath Chief Operating Officer Sasha Javid: “Bidders are leaving the very biggest markets of New York and Los Angeles and moving into smaller markets. Nevertheless, it will be the very biggest markets that will drag auction proceeds above the reserve price should this auction succeed in closing.” Except for C band and a few other auctions, “I always worry about a spectrum auction until it crosses the closing threshold,” former Commissioner Mike O’Rielly told us. 3.45 GHz “was made more difficult by the overinflated agency cost estimate and the flawed spectrum cap per market of 40 MHz,” he said: “I remain optimistic that those bidding will ultimately make it succeed because failure would be extremely detrimental.” The auction has to exceed a $14.77 billion reserve price to close.

Some FCC precision agriculture task force working groups have started submitting their final reports for the consolidated report to the commission, members said during a virtual meeting Thursday. The mapping and analyzing connectivity WG report will include a $4 million cost estimate it received to do a more granular survey, said Chair Michael Adelaine of South Dakota State University. The examining current and future connectivity demand WG submitted its report to be consolidated into the final report, said Chair Dan Leibfried of John Deere. "It does look we have a little bit of conflict" in the draft consolidated report about recommendations on higher speeds, Leibfried said. Task force Chair Teddy Bekele of Land O’Lakes agreed and asked the subpanel to identify what parts of the consolidated report will need to be updated. The encouraging adoption of precision ag WG finished its report, said Chair Mike McCormick of the Mississippi Farm Bureau Federation: "We're really happy with where we are." Accelerating broadband deployment WG Vice Chair Heather Hampton-Knodle of American Agri-Women said its report had no changes.